


you're ripped at every edge (but you're a masterpiece)

by orphan_account



Category: Original Work
Genre: Blood, But also, Dark, Drabble, FUCK, I Tried, Murder, Mystery, Original Character Death(s), Original Character(s), POV Original Character, Poetic, bc theyre the shit nd i think about them most days ngl, hhh this was for school rip, hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, i cant tag this?? tf, i guess, i love myself can you tell uwu, it aint that graphic tho i like making grusome shit sound pretty, lots of metaphors, ok jsksjks, pretty?, tf am i supposed to tag if i cant rant about yoongi's nose or smth, venitian masks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-06-23
Packaged: 2019-05-27 12:31:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15024671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: where the day is expectations and worry and real life, night means the cold kiss of moonlight on still water, the rare taste of freedom, the exquisite blend of dream and nightmare coming together in the air.where day is for existing with the world, night is for living with the dead.





	you're ripped at every edge (but you're a masterpiece)

**Author's Note:**

> you've no idea how much I wanted to use the truth untold lyrics but I Refrained and went for halsey instead fuck you  
> title: colours- halsey
> 
> hhh so this was for a school project months ago and since I evidently can't write happy stuff I decided to write gore and murder. but with pretty metaphors. and masks.  
> :)  
> please please leave comments?? I need them??? to survive????  
> I really cant write anymore and comments on my previous works are the only thing that make me feel better about that so :( please leave constructive criticism.

_Venice_

 

There is something so excruciatingly beautiful about the night- about the smooth transition from light to dark, gold to black. It scorches away the painful _dullness_ of day and the lingering fire of sunset, leaving only night’s cool touch and clear air to ground you. Where the day is expectations and worry and real life, night means the cold kiss of moonlight on still water, the rare taste of freedom, the exquisite blend of dream and nightmare coming together in the air.

Where day is for existing with the world, night is for living with the dead.

 

* * *

 

 

The stars are hidden somewhere behind a haze of black cloud stretched across the sky, but the water maintains a moonlit sheen nonetheless, fluctuating just barely in the breeze. Soundlessly, a shadow makes its way across, piercing the moonlight’s flickering design like the dark edge of a rusted blade and slashing through the velvet surface. Bare eyes follow the destruction with a glint, before the shadow turns and glides away along the bridge.

Tonight, like most nights, is quiet. Unlike most nights, it’s empty, allowing the figure to stalk the narrow streets and canals, twisting around each other in an intricate knot, without interruption.

Between one street and another, one breath and the next, the shadow becomes a person with the ease of a cloak slipping from thin shoulders to the floor, and the flickering glow of a streetlamp pulls a boy, shivering, from the darkness.

For a few seconds, the night is perfectly, deceivingly, silent; the boy stares wide-eyed at the cracked stonewall, trembling but making no move to stop.

_Deceiving._

Slowly, he raises his head, letting blank eyes climb like poison ivy up the weather-beaten walls, over the wooden door, to the cursive script on the sign hanging limply above it:

 

‘ _Sig. Rosso: Creatore di Maschere_ ’

 

Knowing the man would be inside, the boy places both hands on the door and shoves, pleased when it opened easily under his touch. Perfect.

The shop’s main room is understandably empty as he steps- unbeknownst to the owner- over the threshold, but he’s undeterred, closing the door with a deliberate _bang_ behind himself. It won’t be long, anyway.

For now, the boy amuses himself with the room’s decoration; or rather, the masks covering every spare inch of the place. Piles of glaring white faces lay stacked up around him, surrounded by pots of paint and dry brushes, while laboriously painted masks hang from the walls in shining rows, gleaming with varnish and twitching oddly in the watery light.

A crash from his left, followed by a mouthful of rushed, tangled Venetian, draws the boy’s attention towards the masked man standing in the other doorway, messy-haired and panicked.

 _The mask-maker_.

“Hello,” the boy murmurs in English. The mask-maker freezes, swears a second later. “I’d like a mask.”

A moment passes in slow, subdued silence, tinted red with fear. “You- no, no mask-”

“Please.” _Please?_

“You cannot, no-,”

The boy sighs, a bittersweet smile tugging at his mouth, “I asked nicely.”

A second later, the mask-maker falls silent, staring at the rusted knife pressing carefully into his throat. _Small rivulets of blood spill and kiss at his skin, trickling down to pool like rainwater in the valleys of his collarbones._

“Isn’t that what we’re taught? Ask _nicely_.

Silence. _The valleys overflow. Red petals bloom prettily over pale flesh._

The boy cocks his head in an oddly birdlike gesture. “I don’t see what’s so scary about your masks. Or why they always wear them.’

Shadows seep into the blank holes of the man’s mask, painting a chilling smile onto the bone white porcelain. His voice was clear in the face of death.

“ _That’s because you haven’t tried to take one off yet_.”

His words blend with the blood on the floor as the boy leaves, leaving the door open for the daylight to find.

 

* * *

 

Masks, like the night, are often beautiful; though whether they are excruciatingly so is up to the wearer. They hold power, too, within their painted beauty. Strength, woven into the intricate designs. For the first time, as the mask’s bitter cold settles comfortably over his face, the boy understands.

The night holds both dream and nightmare in its grasp, but whether there is more nightmare than dream-

Well. Maybe that’s never up to us, anyway.


End file.
